This is an extremely Christian deck, which ordinarily would
make it not my cup of tea, but its unparalleled beauty pulls me in.This is another deck with a “wow” effect, like the Nefertari Tarot by
the same publishers.The gold foil, like that used on the Nefertari deck, and like
the silver in the Mantegna deck, is stamped with an intricate design.For this deck, the design is made up of angels and curlicues.Of course, it won’t show up on the scans.You just have to see this deck to believe it.

As if the gold stamping weren’t rich enough, it’s
combined with beautiful dark red borders.The
combination of the gold with the red is simply good enough to eat.

Then there’s the pictures themselves.A. A. Atanassov, the artist who did such an excellent job with the
Visconti Gold deck, has really outdone himself.This deck is an outpouring of gorgeous pictures.

For me, the Minor Arcana are actually more interesting than
the Majors.On the gold-stamped
background, the suit symbols float at the top and bottom of the card, and in the
middle is a small scene, painted in vivid, rich colors.I don’t usually comment on the printing quality of decks, because I’m
not knowledgeable about it; but just from looking at the cards, I can tell that
this must have been a difficult job, accomplished brilliantly.The gold stamping is perfect, with no raised impression on the backs of
the cards (as was true with the Nefertari), and the colors are deeper and richer
than other decks.The scenes also
contain gold-stamped highlights.

An example of the excellent design and layout of the cards
is the Nine of Swords, where the sword being raised by the Devil joins the eight
suit-symbol swords to bring the number to nine.While the Three of Swords shows, appropriately enough, a
sorrowful scene (“Adam and Eve thrown out of Eden”), the picture looks so
darn cute, with God’s scolding hand descending from the sky, that it’s
irresistible.

The scenes have all been chosen from Biblical stories, and
they lead to a curious idiosyncrasy with this deck.Mr. Atanassov is credited with “iconographic research,”
and “presentation” is credited to Giordano Berti, with divinatory
instructions by Tiberio Gonard.Now,
I’m not sure from this exactly who did what, but my speculation is that the
person who actually chose the scenes did so based on the visual correlation with
the standard Rider-Waite-Smith scenes (R-W-S).However,
when Mr. Gonard wrote the divinatory meanings, he seems to have derived them
from the background story of the scene chosen, rather than the R-W-S scene which
the artist was emulating.So, for
example, on the Four of Cups, the Prophet Elijah on Mount Horeb is shown as an
old man reclining on a hillside, while a hand with a cup descends from above.The divinatory meaning given is “Invention.Omen.Enlightening.Dream.”

Actually this could be looked at as a good thing.It gives the reader their choice; one can choose to interpret the cards
using standard R-W-S meanings, which would be easy enough given the visual
similarities, or one can follow the divinatory meanings given in the booklet.Doing the latter would allow one the opportunity to gain greater depth of
insight by researching the stories behind the pictures.

The Major Arcana are full-length pictures.It would take a reviewer more conversant with both art history and
Christianity than I am to comment intelligently on them.However, there were three in particular that I found very interesting.

In The Star, the Holy Nativity is illustrated in a very
dynamic picture.There’s a lot
going on here.Joseph, Mary and the
baby Jesus are shown on a rocky hillside.From
inside a dark cave, a horse and cow look down on the infant.The Three Kings on their horses are climbing up the hillside.An angel hovers above, and the guiding star, shown as a shooting star,
zaps down from the heavens.The
star is made up of the same gold stamping as the background.Visually, this is quite an exciting scene.

I liked the Judgement card because it’s shown from the
angels’ perspective rather than the humans.The angels stand at the edge of a hole filled with murky water which
contains three humans (and the hand of a fourth).One angel blows a horn, and the other appears to be using a
long trident to fish the humans out, as if the angels were Eskimos, fishing at
an ice hole.

I was also intrigued by the
World.For such a Christian deck, I would have expected a picture of
Jesus, especially since it’s been established by Robert O’Neill that the
standard picture of a female World Dancer is descended from similar
representations of Jesus.But on
this card, the four evangelists are shown at the corners, and at the center is
simply a starry globe.It makes for
a very interesting and attractive World card.

This deck must inevitably be compared with the Russian
Tarot of St. Petersburg, which also takes as its artistic theme Russian Orthodox
iconography.Unlike the Russian
Tarot, which used the Russian icon style to illustrate Tarot concepts, the Tsar
deck rather does the opposite, using the Tarot framework to present glorious
iconic images.This is confirmed by
the LWB, which says, “In effect, Atanassov did not reinterpret the Tarot or
modify the icons but rather adapted the Tarot to the icons by associating the
traditional meaning of each card to a biblical subject or the portrait of a
saint.From this unavoidable
choice, which radically transforms the traditional Tarot figures, come new
interpretive possibilities.”

In other words, the Russian Tarot is basically a standard
Tarot deck done in an iconographic style, while the Tsar deck is more a set of
icons structured into a Tarot deck.I
have to say that I prefer the Tsar deck for its stunning beauty.I also think this would be an excellent reading deck, especially for a
Christian reader, who will certainly find the new interpretive possibilities
promised by the LWB.

Lee
A. Bursten has been studying Tarot off
and on for about 20 years. He enjoys reading about Tarot and searching for the
"Perfect Deck," which is always just around the corner but out of
reach. He is very grateful to Michele and Diane for posting his reviews, and
especially to his significant other, Larry Katz, for his superhuman patience.